Volunteers in Mission 2004 Photos

A team of eight people from our church (Ralph Atticks, Jan Thomas, Gordon Harvey, Bob Paulen, Linda Owens, Debra Marshall, Kendrick Weaver, and Pete Saderholm) spent a week in southern Florida in early November of 2004 working on Disaster Relief. We stayed at the Trinity United Methodist Church in Arcadia, Florida. It is there that we slept and ate most of our meals. In a temporarily partitioned corner of the Fellowship Hall of this church an office had been set up from which the Disaster Relief work for volunteers for the County was being managed. FEMA and the paid workers meet some place else, but all volunteers came to this church.

We mostly were involved with removing debris from people's property because there was still a lot of it to move and we had the people and equipment to do it. The second day we were there a chap arrived with a BOBCAT and asked if he could be of assistance. He was assigned to our team for the entire week and we moved and removed a lot of trash and downed trees. We cleared about 15 house lots in the week we were there.

As with all Mission Trips each of us on the team was touched by the devastation and the personal loss experienced by individuals. We were able to help each of the families we worked with by performing work that was beyond their capability or was so overwhelming that they did not know where to start. When finished we prayed with each and this was a moving experience for us and them. Everybody should have a opportunity to serve in this fashion.

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